Eco Atlantic to carry out Seismic Survey near Exxon

offshore Guyana

Eco (Atlantic) Oil and Gas, in partnership with Tullow Oil, which has a controlling stake in the Orinduik Block offshore Guyana, announced on Thursday their approval for a ‘2550 km2’ 3D seismic survey in their Block, which is estimated to hold 900 million barrels of recoverable oil.

The survey is expected to commence in the next two weeks and will be completed

Chief Operating Officer and co-founder of Eco Atlantic, Colin Kinley

by Schlumberger Guyana Inc.

Eco Atlantic (Guyana) Inc, a subsidiary of Eco Atlantic, holds a 40 per cent Working Interest in Orinduik, and Tullow, the Operator, holds the remaining 60 per cent.

The Orinduik Block is located just a few kilometers from Exxon’s recent Liza and Payara discoveries confirming, by Exxon’s estimates, in excess of 1.5 billion barrels of recoverable oil.

The company and Tullow have completed the first phase of exploration including evaluating all existing and regional 2D data. Following the results of this study and the ongoing regional success, both parties have agreed to accelerate and significantly increase the originally proposed 1000km2 3D survey commitment on the block to circa 2550 kms2, therefore covering the entire block area, fully overlapping current prospective 2D leads and downdip trends.

As part of its agreement, Tullow will carry the Company’s share of the originally proposed 1000km2 of the survey, at a cap of US$1.25 million, with the balance of the programme being funded by both parties on a pro-rata basis. The additional cost of the enhanced seismic programme to Eco is well covered by existing cash resources following the company’s over-subscribed placing of GBP5.1 million announced in February 2017 in conjunction with its dual listing on the AIM market

Guyana’s oil industry is attracting attention (Getty Images)

of the London Stock Exchange.

Chief Operating Officer and co-founder of Eco Atlantic, Colin Kinley, said his company is “excited to embark on this very significant 3D survey which is substantially greater than the originally planned survey”.

In addition to de-risking the existing two defined targets, the survey will hopefully generate additional targets on the Orinduik Block, thereby increasing the prospective oil in place and adding leads for future work programmes, Kinley said.

We were keenly interested in this region of the Guyana-Suriname Basin even prior to Exxon’s highly successful drilling programme, applying for the Orinduik block in 2014 because of its highly prospective cretaceous canyon and fan plays. We have since been excited to see Exxon continue to successfully prove out the region in its ongoing drilling programme and look forward to results from our own 3D survey, which are expected to come in the next couple of months”.

According to him, the 2D interpretation has led to at least two significant reservoir leads on the Orinduik block that both his company and Tullow believe may hold significant oil comparable to the world class regional discoveries identified by Exxon. Eco Atlantic expects to confirm a number of drilling targets with this increased 3D survey, ahead of drilling of the first well in Orinduik, hopefully in 2018.

The company has also granted 3,500,000 Restricted Shares Units pursuant to the company’s Restricted Share Units Plan of which 3,350,000 RSUs were granted to Directors of the Company as compensation and success fees in relation with the AIM admission and Company’s portfolio and operational developments.